Luke Skywalker has been described as many things through the years – a whiny farmboy, rebel insurgent, and all-wise Jedi Master – but a coward definitely isn’t one of them.
Indeed, while promoting The Last Jedi as part of Entertainment Weekly’s newly-unveiled December issue, Star Wars veteran Mark Hamill warned that his on-screen legend will be little more than a “broken warrior” by the time Rey touches down on Ahch-To.
Still reeling from the destruction of his Jedi Academy, for which he holds himself partly accountable (“I’ve seen this raw strength once before. It didn’t scare me then. It does now”), Luke will be a haunted shell of his former self when Star Wars: The Last Jedi begins, which leaves Rey with little choice but to rekindle his connection with the Force.
Overall, though, Hamill was wary of mimicking the great Alec Guinness with Rey and Luke’s student-master dynamic, and was overly pleased to see Rian Johnson take his character in a surprising new direction – lest The Last Jedi succumb to cliché.
[Director] Rian Johnson could have just made me another benevolent Jedi teacher but, you know, we’ve seen that before. And no one can do it better than Sir Alec Guinness. Instead, this Luke is a broken warrior. And he sees dread in this young pupil, rather than new hope.
On December 15th, the Skywalker saga continues with the launch of Star Wars: The Last Jedi, before J.J. Abrams brings the curtain down with the untitled Episode IX in two years’ time. Sandwiched between those two titans is Solo: A Star Wars Story, and if you’re curious, the film’s erstwhile directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller reflected on their firing over the weekend.
